hi

Good Morning Grads!! I wanted to take a moment to introduce myself. My name is Shannon and I had WLS 2 years ago. I recently gave birth to my first child and I am struggling to lose those last 10lbs that I gained while pregnant. I have been struggling lately with thoughts of defeat.. or failure and my inability to make the scale move. I know where my short comings fall... I just need to overcome them and move on. I look forward to hanging out with you all!! Hope that everyone has a great day! Shannon

Hi, Shannon. Welcome to the Grads boards. There's always good info and good support here. And you are not a failure, you are a possibility. XOXOXO, Sharyn

Hi Shannon! I replied to Toni's & Karen's "14 months out" post, and I've attached this same reply to you too. Hope it helps! I'm Nancy and my surgery was June 1999! I was reading your concerns and believe me, I go through it even today - 7 years later. Binging and eating junk food is part of the reason we all got in this boat to begin with. We all need to realize that these same problems existed BEFORE the surgery too and that this surgery is not capable of taking away those "bad habits" we all still have. It's a "mental" thing as well as a physical thing. The new habit of "grazing" took the place of the way we used to eat, therefore we're eating the same calories - just in smaller, spread out portions. Our brains are VERY smart! Ha, ha. Anyway, at my lowest weight I had lost a little over 100 pounds and at my current weight, I am about 14 pounds up. Even though I knew I was going to gain SOME weight eventually and 14 pounds in 7 years is not too bad, I too was concerned. It's hard to loose any weight at 46 years old! I love that "calorie budget" theory someone suggested. That's a great analogy. It's basically what I also started doing about 6 weeks ago. However I had help incorporating it into my daily life. I would like to recommend the following to EVERYONE that's reading this... 1. Look into CURVES. I joined about six weeks ago and have taken off both inches and pounds since. Do you do ANY exercise? I absolutely did not! It will help! My body needed a "kick start" and that did the trick. It's actually fun, you meet a lot of great women and it's truly really a quick routine! If you can spare one hour; 2 or 3 times a week - check it out, you have nothing to loose, but weight and inches! 2. iVillage.com. It's a wonderful reference site. Click on Diet and Fitness. Actually, check out the entire site; it's GREAT! I use the several "calculators" they have available on there! Especially the calorie one. I can type in most anything and it calculates the protein, fat, carb., calorie, sodium, etc. in just one click. There's also a Daily Diet Diary. You can join it for free and it keeps track of your daily food intake (It totals it and everything for you!), water, vitamins, exercise, etc. I love it! Bottom line is this. It didn't take a few months for us to get to our original weight, it's not going to take a few months to loose all of the weight we need to loose, and no matter what, eventually... you, me, everyone that had this surgery - will have a problem loosing that last few pounds or even GAIN SOME WEIGHT BACK! It's gonna take a jesture on our part (again) to get back on track. Just don't be afraid - it CAN be fixed. Just take one day at a time and good luck. Nancy : )